I'm not actually a Buddhist, but occasionally I like to pretend that I am.
So I'm putting on my Buddhist persona for this blog post in which I demonstrate my boundless compassion for all sentient beings by telling Donald Trump what he needs to do to defeat Kamala Harris and win the election this November.
Even though that prospect fills my non-Buddhist self with revulsion. But since there's basically a zero chance that Trump will take this advice, I feel fine sharing it.
Donald, things haven't been going well for you lately. Sure, your surviving the failed assasination attempt garnered you some well-deserved sympathy. And Biden's meltdown in the debate seemed to open the door to a fairly easy electoral college win for you.
But then Biden closed that door when he withdrew from the presidential race and threw his support behind Kamala Harris. Ever since, Harris has had the momentum, not you.
Nate Silver's election prediction model gave Biden a 27% chance of winning prior to his dropping out. And Silver said that likely was an overestimate. Now the model has Harris with a 45% chance of winning, with you having a 55% chance.
In other words, basically a toss-up.
It seems clear that you didn't expect this when you went mostly MAGA in your acceptance speech at the Republican convention. Or when you chose J.D. Vance to be your running mate, a MAGA mini-me.
Now you and your campaign have to figure out how to handle Harris. Obviously you aren't doing a great job at this so far, or Harris wouldn't have such a good chance of defeating you this November, with more upside looming for Harris than for you.
I know you don't like to read lengthy documents. I recall that the intelligence community had to put their daily briefings in kind of a comic book form to hold your attention: few words, lots of pictures. So I'll keep the core of my advice to you really simple: Don't be an asshole.
Look, I know that's tough for you to do. But you managed it near the end of the 2016 campaign when you stopped doing crazy stuff on Twitter and sounded relatively sane for a while.
As a Democrat, I was worried that you were going to do this again following your brush with death at the Pennsylvania rally. You said, briefly, that the experience had changed you. Your acceptance speech was supposed to be a plea for unity.
For 30 minutes, it was. Then your inner asshole reared its ugly head again and you spent the next hour or so free associating your way through a bunch of crazy, divisive, untrue blather that you relish spouting at your campaign rallies.
Except this was your chance to reach a much bigger audience. Which you blew. But there's still time for you to tone down your B.S. and sound like someone who deserves to lead our country and the free world through challenging times.
You've got to stop doing stupid stuff if you want to beat Harris. She's a savvy politician and experienced prosecutor. Harris isn't going to make any big mistakes. You can't count on her tripping and stumbling like Biden did. You're going to have to win through your own improved strategy.
Give this a try.
Nest time you're invited to speak to a group that has ties to an important voting bloc, don't insult representatives of that group and denigrate a member of the voting bloc. That's what you did yesterday when you went to an association of black journalists.
You started off by lambasting the first black journalist who asked you a question, calling her a nasty person. Then you said that Kamala Harris, who is half black and half Indian, had always identified as Indian until she decided that now she was black.
The journalist correctly told you that this wasn't true, that Harris has always said she was black. She went to a black university, belonged to a black sorority, and was a member of the Black Congressional Caucus after she became a senator.
So instead of making a case for why blacks should vote for you, you gave them some great reasons to vote for Harris, given how racist and sexist you sounded. Not a great strategy for winning a presidential election.
If you don't know how to act like a normal human being, take a crash course in this. It'll be a great asset for you in the remaining months of the campaign. Voters were tired of Biden being Biden. They're also tired of Trump being Trump.
Harris is a fresh face. You need to freshen your own face, and I don't mean by altering the makeup you so dearly love to wear. I mean by becoming a kinder and gentler Trump, something you seemed to be on the verge of after the bullet nicked your ear rather than passing through your brain.
Today several Americans, along with others held in Russian prisons, were released as part of a complicated prisoner exchange swap ably negotiated by the Biden administration. This was your chance to show that you're a patriotic American who is pleased when some of our citizens who have been wrongly jailed by Russia finally are freed.
But no, you couldn't help yourself. Once again, you acted like an asshole.
Former President Donald Trump has been using the wrongful detention of Americans Evan Gershkovich and Paul Whelan in Russia to criticize President Joe Biden for failing to bring them home, especially during his reelection campaign.
And following Thursday's historic prisoner swap that freed those men along with two other U.S. prisoners, the GOP presidential nominee continued to bash the administration with baseless speculation.
White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan confirmed on Thursday that there was no cash exchanged nor was there any sanctions relief, but in a Truth Social post on Thursday, Trump questioned that denial without offering specifics.
Look, I'm trying to give you some good advice in this brief period of my Buddha-like compassion for you winning out over my usual hatred of you.
But I can't make you stop doing stupid stuff that not only won't help you beat Harris, but is digging your electoral hole deeper. Somehow you've got to do something that I know is virtually impossible for you.
Act like a decent human being. If you could pull this off for the next three months, you'd have a much better chance of returning to the White House. Fortunately -- my compassion must be losing steam -- you won't do this, so probably we're going to enjoy a President Harris.
Comments